1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a digital camera capable of outputting picture (image) data to an external apparatus, a picture data managing device, a picture data managing method, and a recording medium in which a picture data managing program is recorded.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, digital cameras have been equipped with a display such as an LCD, which functions as a view finder, and which allows a photographed picture to be reproduced and confirmed on the display without using any other devices. In such a digital camera, a picture of a subject imaged by a solid imaging device such as a CCD is recorded as picture data in a recording medium such as a flash memory. Pieces of the picture data are compressed in a predetermined format such as JPEG (Joint Photographic Expert Group) and are then recorded in an order they were photographed in the recording medium as picture files having file names each consisting of, for example, a date and time.
Furthermore, some digital cameras typically utilize cable communication, for example via a USB (Universal Serial Bus) connection, or wireless communication, for example via infrared light, to thereby transmit picture data to an external apparatus such as another digital cameras or a personal computer. Digital cameras may also have a detachable memory such as the above-mentioned recording medium, which may be attached to the external apparatus so that the external apparatus can access the picture data. Therefore, with such a digital camera, the picture data recorded by photographing can be accessed on a personal computer and copied on a floppy disk, for example, so that the pictures may be distributed to a plurality of persons. That is, it is possible to make extra copies of photographed images, as is possible with silver-salt cameras.
However, in an attempt to copy specific picture data to a floppy disk with a personal computer, it is difficult to identify the picture to be copied using only the above-mentioned file name. Accordingly, it is necessary to display and confirm on a monitor the pictures in the order (or reverse order) they were photographed and then to select a specific one of them and copy it on a floppy disk. It is thus troublesome and inefficient to distribute many pictures to many persons. In particular, when a personal computer with a low picture processing capability is used, it takes a long time to confirm the pictures to be copied, thus causing the process of copying and distributing the pictures to be remarkably inefficient.